Vegas @ Tampa Bay preview

Last Meeting ( Feb 5, 2019 ) Vegas 3, Tampa Bay 2

The Tampa Bay Lightning play their first home game in three weeks and attempt to remain unbeaten against Pacific Division foes when they host the Vegas Golden Knights on Tuesday night. The Lightning went 4-1-1 in the last six games on the road - sandwiching the All-Star break - after capping their tour of California with a 3-0 victory at San Jose on Saturday, and go for their first home win against Vegas.

Tampa Bay is 8-0-0 versus the Pacific this season after knocking off Los Angeles and Anaheim along with the Sharks last week and have at least a point in the last 13 meetings with the division (12-0-1), but are still searching for the form that led to a 10-game winning streak between the end of December and start of January. “I still don’t think we’re at the right mindset in terms of the way we control play (with decision-making),” Lightning captain Steven Stamkos told reporters after the latest win. “It’s getting better as we’ve progressed after the break. There’s still some areas we can improve in, but we’re getting the results lately, so it’s a process and I like the direction we’re headed.” The Golden Knights were scuffling before the break with one victory in seven games (1-5-1), but have responded with a 4-3 win at Carolina on Friday and followed that up with a 3-0 shutout at Nashville 24 hours later. “I thought we were good, that was a really solid 60,” Vegas coach Peter DeBoer told reporters after Saturday’s win. “We talked last night about building on the good things we did in (Friday’s) game. I thought we did that tonight for 60 minutes. It started with our defensive play.”

TIME: 7 p.m. ET. TV: AT&T SportsNet Rocky Mountain, FS Sun, TVA

ABOUT THE GOLDEN KNIGHTS (27-20-7): Right wing Reilly Smith capped Saturday’s victory with his 21st goal of the season to tie for the team lead with left wing Max Pacioretty, who shares the top spot in points (48) with right wing Mark Stone. Pacioretty managed three of his points in the last seven contests and Stone recorded two goals along with three assists in the past five games, while former Lightning forward Jonathan Marchessault boasts five points in the past four contests. Forward Chandler Stephenson has seven goals, 14 points and a plus-14 rating in 25 games since being acquired from Washington.

ABOUT THE LIGHTNING (32-15-5): Right wing Nikita Kucherov shoveled two beautiful backhand shots into the net in each of the last two games to push his team-leading total to 24 goals and extend his point streak to seven contests (seven goals). “That’s just part of the skill set Kuch has,” Stamkos told reporters after extending his point streak to seven games (six goals) on Saturday. “Not too many players can make that play on their backhand like that.” Andrei Vasilevskiy (26-9-3), who sat out Saturday as Curtis McElhinney earned the shutout, is 12-0-1 in his last 13 games and had a .948 save percentage in January.

OVERTIME

1. Vegas G Marc-Andre Fleury reached 20 wins for the 12th time Saturday with his third shutout of the season and is 20-12-4 all time versus the Lightning.

2. Tampa Bay C Brayden Point has not added to his 18-goal total in 10 games, but posted six assists in the past five contests.

3. The Golden Knights are 3-1-0 in their first four meetings with the Lightning, winning both in Tampa Bay.

PREDICTION: Lightning 3, Golden Knights 2